and likewise indicates those for whom it is obligatory and those for whom it is not. He writes: “5, 6. The insolvent debtor who fears imprisonment, and the person hiding from an unjust ruler. Concerning them, Ibn ʿAbbās (may Allah be pleased with him) narrated that the Prophet ﷺ said: ‘Whoever hears the call to prayer and does not respond, he has no prayer unless he has an excuse.’ They asked, ‘Messenger of Allah, what is an excuse?’ He replied, ‘Fear or illness.’ Abū Dāwūd transmitted it with a sound chain.”

I say: This contains two errors.

First: Abū Dāwūd’s chain is not sound, because it includes Abū Janāb, who is weak and a mudallis, and he relates it with an ʿanʿanah, as al-Ḥāfiẓ stated in al-Talkhīṣ. Al-Munḏirī likewise judged it weak in Mukhtaṣar al-Sunan.

Second: The wording cited is not that of Abū Dāwūd; rather, it is a patchwork of two narrations. One of them is Abū Dāwūd’s version, whose wording is:

“Whoever hears the caller and is not prevented from following him by an excuse—They said, ‘What is an excuse?’ He said, ‘Fear or sickness’—the prayer he performs will not be accepted from him.”

With this wording and chain it was also reported by al-Dāraqutnī and by al-Ḥākim in one of his transmissions.

The other narration says:

“Whoever hears the call to prayer and does not answer it, he has no prayer except with an excuse.”

It was recorded by Ibn Mājah and others, and al-Ḥākim said, “Sound according to the criteria of the two Shaykhs,” and al-Ḏhahabī concurred; and it is as they said.

I cannot believe the author would permit himself to splice together two separate reports—especially when one of them